Bruce Slutsky was born in New York City in 1949. I recently retired after working as a Science/Engineering Librarian at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark for 25 years. I have been married to Karen since 1983. We have a son Lee who is now 30 years old. I am very much interested in the popular music of the 1960s especially Bob Dylan and the Beatles. I am interested in rock and roll radio. Since the inception of the team in 1962 I have been a big fan of the New York Mets.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Who is your friend on Facebook

Social networking has become very popular over the past few years among people of all ages. I attended a conference where a librarian talked about how she used Facebook to develop relationships with students. She mentioned that it works better to reinforce friendships that you already have rather than creating new friends. When it began Facebook was available only to academics. One had to have a .edu e-mail to join, but that changed to allow everyone to join. I made friends with many NJIT students even though I did not "know" them. Yesterday a student asked to see me and as you approached my office she seemed impressed that I knew who she was. I did say I made friends with her through Facebook. I also made friends with several of my students from Freshman Seminar.

Over the last 3 years I have made "friends" with

NJIT colleagues

NJIT students

College friends (from 40 years ago)

High school classmates (from over 40 years ago)

Radio enthusiasts

Bob Dylan fans

Mets fans

Colleagues from other universities

Relatives

People with the surname Slutsky, even though we are not related

People I don't even know. Other people take the expression "friend" literally.

I have about 350 Facebook "friends" many I don't even know

I have found out some interesting facts about people:

Mark and Richard who are librarians at other New Jersey universities are also Bob Dylan fans.

Joe, my beer drinking buddy from CCNY is still a big Mets fan even though he moved to California years ago. He is also a radio enthusiast

My nephew, a student at SUNY Oswego attended a Bob Dylan concert there

The librarian who spoke about Facebook is dating one of my NJIT colleagues

My colleague at an upstate New York university had a baby recently

A former NJIT colleague was recently granted tenure at another university

We all must be careful about what we write on Facebook since anyone can see what was written. People do have minor conflicts all the time. I think it is quite immature to de-friend a person after a difference of opinion about something. This has happened to me a few times.